Romans 8:7

As long as the flesh lives … it is not possible for the pleasing and perfect will of God to be done expeditiously in the life of the believer.

"Because the carnal mind is enmity against God:" and this is worse than death. Then to show how it is at once death and enmity; "for it is not subject to the Law of God," he says, "neither indeed can be." But be not troubled at hearing the "neither indeed can be." For this difficulty admits of an easy solution. For what he here names "carnal mindedness" is the reasoning that is earthly, gross, and eager-hearted after the things of this life and its wicked doings. It is of this he says "neither yet can" it "be subject" to God. And what hope of salvation is there left, if it be impossible for one who is bad to become good? This is not what he says. Else how would Paul have become such as he was? how would the (penitent) thief, or Manasses, or the Ninevites, or how would David after falling have recovered himself? How would Peter after the denial have raised himself up? How could he that had lived in fornication have been enlisted among Christ's fold? How could the Galatians who had "fallen from grace" have attained their former dignity again? What he says then is not that it is impossible for a man that is wicked to become good, but that it is impossible for one who continues wicked to be subject to God. Yet for a man to be changed, and so become good, and subject to Him, is easy. For he does not say that man cannot be subject to God, but, wicked doing cannot be good. As if he had said, fornication cannot be chastity, nor vice virtue. And this it says in the Gospel also, "A corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit," not to bar the change from virtue to vice, but to say how incapable continuance in vice is of bringing forth good fruits. For He does not say that an evil tree cannot become a good one, but that bring forth good fruit it cannot, while it continues evil. For that it can be changed, He shows from this passage, and from another parable, when He introduces the tares as becoming wheat, on which score also He forbids their being rooted up; "Lest," He says, "ye root up also the wheat with them"; that is, that which will spring from them.

The flesh is not in itself hostile to God, as the Manichaeans say, but the carnal mind is. For everything which is not subject is hostile, and anyone who wants to clear himself may sometimes go beyond the limit of the old law. Paul says that this carnal wisdom can never be subject to the law of God in order to call men back from the desires of the flesh.

Paul explains why he said “hostile” so that no one should think that there is some nature derived from an opposing principle which God did not create and which fights against him. An enemy of God is one who does not submit to his law and who behaves this way because of the wisdom of the flesh. This means that he seeks worldly goods and is afraid of worldly evils. The normal definition of wisdom is to seek what is good and avoid what is evil. Therefore the apostle is right to describe the wisdom of the flesh as the longing for “goods” which do not remain with a man and when there is a fear for losing those things which one day will have to be left behind anyway. Wisdom of this kind cannot submit to the law of God. It must be destroyed so that the wisdom of the Spirit, which does not place its hope in worldly goods nor is afraid of worldly evils, may take its place. For the one nature of the soul has both the wisdom of the flesh when it follows lower things and the wisdom of the Spirit when it chooses higher things, just as the one nature of water freezes in the cold and melts in the heat.

In the preceding section [n. 612] the Apostle had presupposed that the prudence of the flesh is death, and here he intends to prove this. And first, he proves it; 308 secondly, he shows that the believers to whom he writes are immune to such prudence, there [v. 9; n. 625] at But you are not in the flesh. In regard to the first he does two things. First, he proves his statement about prudence of the flesh in the abstract; secondly, he applies what he had said about prudence of the flesh to those who follow prudence of the flesh, there [v. 8; n. 624] at And those who are in the flesh. In regard to the first he sets out three middle [terms], each of which proves the one before it. 620. Using the first middle, he proves something stated earlier [n. 617], namely, that the prudence of the flesh is death, in the following way: He that is hostile to God incurs death: "But as for those enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slay them before me" (Lk 19:27); and this because God is our life: "For he is your life" (Dt 30:20). And so, he that is hostile to God incurs death; but the wisdom of the flesh is hostile to God. Therefore, the prudence of the flesh is the cause of death. 621. Here it should be noted that what he earlier called the prudence of the flesh he now calls the wisdom of the flesh, not because prudence and wisdom are absolutely the same but because wisdom in human matters is prudence: "Wisdom is prudence to a man" (Pr 10:23). To understand this it should be recognized that one who knows the highest cause on which all things depend is called wise in the strict sense. But the supreme cause absolutely of all things is God. Therefore, wisdom in the strict sense is knowledge of divine things, as Augustine says in The Trinity: "Yet among the mature we do impart 309 wisdom" (1 Cor 2:6). Now one who knows the highest cause in a particular genus is said to be wise in that genus. For example, in the art of building it is not the man who knows how to cut wood and stones but the one who conceives and plans the house who is called wise; for the entire building depends on him. Hence the Apostle says in 1 Cor 3(:10), "As a wise architect I have laid the foundation." Thus, therefore, one is called wise in human matters who has a good understanding about the goal of human life and regulates the whole of human life accordingly, which pertains to prudence. And thus the wisdom of the flesh is the same as the prudence of the flesh, about which James 3(:15) says that it is "not such as comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, devilish." This wisdom is said to be hostile to God, because it inclines a man against God’s law: "Running stubbornly against him with a thick-bossed shield" (Jb 15:26). 622. To prove this he uses another middle, adding: it is not subject to the law of God. For a person cannot hate God according to what he is in himself, since God is the very essence of goodness; but a sinner hates God inasmuch as some precept of the divine law is contrary to his will, as an adulterer hates God inasmuch as he hates the precept: "You shall not commit adultery." And so all sinners, inasmuch as they are unwilling to submit to God’s law, are hostile to God: "Should you love those who hate the Lord?" (2 Chr 19:2). Hence, he has satisfactorily proved that the prudence or wisdom of the flesh is hostile to God, because it is not subject to the law of God. 310 623. He proves this [argument] through a third middle [term], saying: nor can it be. For the prudence of the flesh is a form of vice, as is clear from what has been said. But although a person subject to a vice can be freed from it and submit to God, as it says above (6:18): "Having been set free from sin, you have become slaves of righteousness," the vice itself cannot submit to God, since the vice itself is a turning away from God or from God’s law; just as something black can become white, but the blackness itself can never become white: "An evil tree cannot bear good fruit" (Mt 7:18). From this it is clear that the Manicheans were not correct in using these words to support their error, for they wished by these words to show that the nature of the flesh is not from God, since it is hostile to God and cannot be subject to God. For the Apostle is not dealing here with the flesh, which is a creature of God, but of the prudence of the flesh, which is a human vice, as has been said. 624. Then when he says And those who are in the flesh, he applies what he had said about prudence of the flesh to men whom the prudence of the flesh rules, saying: Those who are in the flesh, i.e., who follow the desires of the flesh by the prudence of the flesh, so long as they are this way cannot please God, because, as it says in Ps 147(:11), "The Lord takes pleasure in those who fear him." Hence those who do not submit to him cannot please him, so long as they remain such. But they can cease to be in the flesh according to the manner described and then they will be pleasing to God. 625. Then when he says But you, he shows that those to whom he is speaking are immune from the prudence of the flesh. In regard to this he does three things. First, he 311 describes the state of believers, saying: But you are not in the flesh. This makes it clear that he is not speaking about the nature of the flesh. For the Romans, to whom he was speaking, were mortal men clothed in flesh. Rather, he is taking flesh for the vices of the flesh, as in 1 Cor 15(:50), "Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God." Hence he says You are not in the flesh, i.e., you are not in the vices of the flesh as though living according to the flesh: "Living in the flesh, we do not wage war according to the flesh" (2 Cor 10:3). But in the spirit, i.e., you follow the spirit: "I was in the spirit on the Lord’s day" (Rev 1:10). 626. Secondly, he appends a condition, saying: if the Spirit of God dwells in you, namely, through love: "You are God’s temple, and God’s Spirit dwells in you" (1 Cor 3:16). He appends this condition because, even though they received the Holy Spirit in baptism, they might through a later sin have lost the Holy Spirit. Concerning this it says in Wis 1(:5) that [the Holy Spirit] "will not abide when iniquity comes in." 627. Thirdly, he shows that this condition should be found in them, saying: Now if anyone does not have not the Spirit of Christ, he is not his. For just as that is not a bodily member which is not enlivened by the body’s spirit, so he is not Christ’s member who does not have the Spirit of Christ: "By this we know that we abide in him, because he has given us of his own Spirit" (1 Jn 4:13). It should be noted that the Spirit of Christ and of God the Father is the same; but he is called the Spirit of God the Father inasmuch as he proceeds from the Father, and the Spirit of Christ inasmuch as he proceeds from the Son. Hence the Lord always ascribes him to both, as in John 14(:26), "But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father 312 will send in my name" and again: "When the Counselor comes whom I will send to you from the Father" (Jn 15:26). 628. Then [n. 595] when he says But if Christ, he shows that through the grace of Christ or through the Holy Spirit we are freed from punishment. And first, he shows that we are freed by the Holy Spirit in the future from bodily death; secondly that in the meantime the Holy Spirit helps us against the infirmities of the present life, there [v. 26; n. 686] at Similarly the Spirit; Concerning the first he does three things. First, he sets out what he intends; Secondly, he draws a corollary from this, there [n. 631] at Therefore, brethren; Thirdly, he proves his proposition, there [v. 14; n. 634] at For all who are led. In regard to the first it should be recalled that above he mentioned the Spirit of God and the Spirit of Christ, although it is one and the same Spirit. First, therefore, he shows what we obtain from the Spirit inasmuch as he is the Spirit of Christ; secondly, inasmuch as he is the Spirit of God the Father, there [v. 11; n. 630] at And if the Spirit of him. 629. He says, therefore: We have said that if one does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to him; hence, since you belong to Christ, you have the Spirit of Christ and Christ himself dwelling in you through faith: "That Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith" (Eph 3:17). But if Christ is thus in you, you should be conformed to Christ. 313 Now Christ so came into the world that as far as the Spirit was concerned, he was full of grace and truth, but as for the body, he had the likeness of sinful flesh, as was stated above. Hence this should also be in you, that your body indeed, because of sin which still remains in your flesh is dead, i.e., subject to the necessity death: "In whatsoever day you eat it, you shall die the death" (Gen 2:17), i.e., subject to the necessity of death; but the spirit lives, being recalled from sin: "Be renewed in the spirit of your minds" (Eph 4:23); it lives with the life of grace because of justification, through which it is justified by God: "The life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of sod" (Gal 2:20); "The just man lives by faith" (Rom 1:17). 630. Then when he says And if the Spirit, he shows what we obtain from the Holy Spirit inasmuch as he is the Spirit of the Father, saying: If the Spirit of him, namely, of God the Father, who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you: "But do thou, O Lord, be gracious to me and raise me up" (Ps 41:10); "Him God raised from the dead" (Acts 3:14). Although Christ rose by his own power, because the power of the Father and of the Son is the same, it follows that what God the Father did in Christ, he can also do in us. And this is what he says: He who raised Jesus Christ from the dead will enliven your mortal bodies. He does not say "dead" but "mortal," because in the resurrection there will be taken away from our bodies not only that they are dead, i.e., necessarily having to die, but also that they are mortal, i.e., capable of dying, as was Adam’s body before sin. For after the resurrection our bodies will be wholly immortal: "Thy dead shall live, their bodies shall rise" (Is 26:19); "After two days he will revive us" (Hos 6:2). 314 And this because of his indwelling Spirit in you, i.e., in virtue of the Spirit dwelling in you: "Thus says the Lord God to these bones: Behold I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live" (Ezek 37:5). And this is because of his indwelling Spirit, i.e., on account of the dignity our bodies have from being receptacles of the Holy Spirit: "Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit?" (1 Cor 6:19). Those indeed whose bodies were not temples of the Spirit will also rise, but their bodies will be able to suffer. 631. Then when he says Therefore, brethren, he draws a corollary from the foregoing. And first, he sets out a conclusion; secondly, he gives the reason, there [v. 13; n. 633] at For if. First, therefore, he says: We have said that many benefits flow to us through the Holy Spirit and that from the prudence of the flesh follows death; therefore, we are debtors, not to the flesh, but to the Holy Spirit on account of the benefits received from him, to live according to the Spirit and not according to the flesh: "If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit" (Gal 5:25). 633. Then when he says For if you live according to the flesh, he gives the reason for the above conclusion. And first, as to the flesh, saying: If you live according to the flesh, namely, by following the desires of the flesh, you will die, namely, the death of guilt in the present and the death of damnation in the future: "She who is self-indulgent is dead even while she lives" (1 Tim 5:6). 315 Secondly, he gives a reason as to the spirit, saying: but if by the Spirit you mortify the deeds of the flesh, i.e., deeds which flow from the desires of the flesh, you will live, namely, the life of grace in the present and the life of glory in the future: "Put to death what is earthly in you" (Col 3:5); "Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified their flesh with its passions and desires" (Gal 5:24).